Champlain Valley Apiaries

Champlain Valley Apiaries is a 3rd generation Vermont family owned business. Founded in 1931 by historic beekeeper Charles Mraz, we have been producing delicious Vermont honey for over 80 years. Our mission, along with producing the highest quality honey, is to foster sustainable agriculture and promote the importance of honeybees to our food system. We produce both liquid and naturally crystallized “100% Raw” honey. The naturally crystallized honey is unheated and unfiltered. Because of this, the enzymes and esters that give it a delicious flavor and many healthful properties remain intact in our honey. Our honey is gathered from a variety of floral sources, primarily legumes such as clover, alfalfa, and birdsfoot trefoil. Bees also gather nectar from trees, dandelion, and goldenrod, among many others. Each barrel of honey we produce is a floral “snapshot” of a particular area at a given time. The exact makeup of our honey will vary from year to year and even from bee yard to bee yard. In order to keep a consistent product, we blend our Vermont honey with other premium honeys produced in the U.S. and Canada. We treat our bees organically, and during the winter, leave hives with enough of their own honey for winter-feed. We have been using this approach since the 1950’s. Throughout the company’s history, our methods have been widely known among beekeepers to produce a hardy strain of honeybee that is resistant to disease and thrives even in the harshest of Vermont winters.